Voting Rights

African Americans

Prior to the Civil War, few African Americans enjoyed the right to vote. Throughout the South, slaves and free people of color were denied basic civil and political rights. The situation in the North was not much better. Only five states, all in New England, allowed Blacks to vote on the same basis as Whites.

In the aftermath of the Civil War, Congress passed several laws expanding African American rights. The Reconstruction Acts of 1867 required the former Confederate states, as a condition of their read-mission to the Union, to allow freedmen to vote. The Fourteenth Amendment, ratified in 1868, granted citizenship to the former slaves and promised all persons “equal protection of the laws.” The Fifteenth Amendment, ratified in 1870, did not positively guarantee the right to vote, but forbade discrimination against potential Black voters. The “Enforcement Acts” further strengthened Black voting rights. From 1867 to 1877, African Americans freely participated in southern politics, winning many local and state offices.

The withdrawal of federal troops from the South following the contested election of 1876, however, began the erosion of Black voting rights. The Ku Klux Klan used intimidation and violence to drive Black voters from the polls. Gerrymandered election districts minimized Black political power. Despite widespread election fraud, Blacks continued to vote in substantial numbers. The drive to eliminate Black political power reached its zenith in 1890, when the Mississippi constitutional convention adopted residency requirements, literacy standards, tests of “good character,” and disqualification of criminals to disenfranchise African Americans. When the Supreme Court ruled that the Mississippi provisions were not “on their face” discriminatory, other states rapidly followed suit.

The “grandfather clause” was another ingenious device to prevent Black voting. This law exempted from the literacy requirement men who could vote prior to 1867 and their descendants. Since only White men were eligible before this date, it disqualified Blacks without mentioning race. The poll tax also was used to discourage Black voters. All southern states except Arkansas and Texas required voters to pay a yearly fee of $1 or $2, effectively eliminating most Blacks and many poor Whites as well. By 1910, the combined effect of these measures had largely eliminated African Americans from southern politics. In Mississippi, only 6% of adult Blacks were registered voters; in Alabama, the figure was just 2%.

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